Malaysia to Thailand, Damn it's hot!!!

It was a four day ride into KL (Kuala Lumpur). We started in JB and cycled to PK to Muar to PD. Everyone in Malaysia pronounces the cities by their initials like the hip people in Toronto that call the city TO. The Petronas towers stood out in the skyline of KL and helped guide us into the downtown core of the metropolitan city. The infrastructure was well designed by their civil engineers. The light rail transit system was outstanding. We had an inspiring interview in PJ, we took the LRT to meet with a NGO called CETDEM. Ok no more acronyms... Tan Siew Luang and her colleagues provided us with some good information about the organic farming movement, sustainable housing and alternative energy in Malaysia.

We headed north to the Cameron Highlands to meet 2 organic farmers. We met Fung after climbing a 40km 1000m ascent, needless to say our legs were a little rubbery but the scenery and waterfalls were breathtaking. Fung had a great piece of land in a small village in the mountains. He gave us an excellent tour and a great interview of his farm and his practices. We were introduced to another local farmer Mr. Ho and his son Jason. Jason operated the organic farm while his father ran a few local businesses including an organic restaurant where Kevin and I enjoyed and Organic steamboat dinner. It was hands down the best meal we had in Malaysia. The Cameron Highlands had a really cool climate which was a refreshing change from the humidity and hot temperatures in the lowlands. The crops were much different in this area due to the more temperate weather, which was considered the salad bowl of the country.



We continued towards Pinang and bumped into a fellow cycle tourist named David. He took us on a whirlwind tour for the short time we stayed with him. We went to a Chinese Funeral, visited a pottery shop where they made hand crafted pottery on site, a rice mill, 2 prawn farms, a fish farm, to "hell" in a Chinese temple in the middle of a huge palm oil plantation and another Hindi Temple. He also helped us with meeting another Organic Farm in Pinang where David was introduced to Organic farms for the first time. A big thanks to Kenny and Tan who drove us around Pinang to the local organic farm. We saw our first live organic pineapple, I never knew they grow straight up from the ground and take 4 months to produce one fruit, whoa! David then showed us around to some of the local spots where they drink "totty" which comes from a coconut tree by splitting a chute which produces a juice which ferments and turns alcoholic in 2-3 hours. It is only good up to 8 hours but the longer you wait the stiffer the alcohol content. The only downfall is it smells more sulfury near 8 hours.

We are now on an exotic Thai beach getting some well deserved R&R after doing a 7 day haul up the Thai coast. I hope it is not to cold in Canada... hahahaha. We hope everyone in Canada has voted for our new PM, we did our Civic duty overseas here in Kuala Lumpur. We have met up with our friend Coral from Ottawa, she is also an Organic Farmer from Plan B Organic farm in Flamborough Ontario. We have our first female rider woohooo!! I hope I did not scare her off, the first day we met with hit the beach and I broke out my Romanian speedo courtesy of our good friend Gabi. I won't post that picture on the web, we want people to come back and visit our adventure.

Peace out, Steve.